Abstract
Social participation has been understood in many different ways, and there are even typologies classifying participation by the degree of a population's control in decision making. Participation can vary from a symbolic act, which does not involve decision making, to processes in which it constitutes the principal tool for redistributing power within a population. This article argues that analyzing social participation from a perspective of power relations requires knowledge of the historical, social, and economic processes that have characterized the social relations in a specific context. Applying such an analysis to Guatemala reveals asymmetrical power relations characterized by a long history of repression and political violence. The armed conflict during the second half of the 20th century had devastating consequences for a large portion of the population as well as the country's social leadership. The ongoing violence resulted in negative psychosocial effects among the population, including mistrust toward institutions and low levels of social and political participation. Although Guatemala made progress in creating spaces for social participation in public policy after signing the Peace Accords in 1996, the country still faces after-effects of the conflict. One important task for the organizations that work in the field of health and the right to health is to help regenerate the social fabric and to rebuild trust between the state and its citizens. Such regeneration involves helping the population gain the skills, knowledge, and information needed in order to participate in and affect formal political processes that are decided and promoted by various public entities, such as the legislative and executive branches, municipal governments, and political parties. This process also applies to other groups that build citizenship through participation, such as neighborhood organizations and school and health committees.
Highlights
Over the past 40 years, the concept of social participation has gained increasing attention among groups as diverse as anti-globalization social movements, actors working for the right to health, and international financial organizations such as the World Bank.[1]
It appears that these groups agree on the importance of promoting social participation, it is unlikely that they have the same understanding of what the concept means or how to promote it
We look at today’s enormous challenges for social participation and the different strategies and activities being employed to address those challenges
Summary
This is a published version of a paper published in Health and Human Rights: An International Journal. In Guatemala, the power relations existing within social participation processes have taken place in the context of a history of repression and political violence that has affected the country since colonial days.[24] The case of the indigenous uprising led by Atanasio Tzul and Lucas Akiral in 1820, and its social and political consequences for indigenous peoples, illustrates that violence and repression have been part of the Guatemalan state’s operation since before its independence.[25] In addition, the way in which the government of the liberal revolution of 1871 crushed the desires for independence of the State of Los Altos contributed negatively to the creation of the bipolar categories of ethnicity that currently exist in Guatemala.[26] These dynamics of uprising and repression are found throughout the history of the country Those most widely known and documented are probably the ones that took place in the second half of the 20th century, in the context of the Cold War and anti-Communist struggle.
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